Thursday
Feb102011
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Climategate in LaStampa
Feb 10, 2011 Climate: CRU Climate: HSI Climate: Parliament Sightings 
The Italian newspaper LaStampa has an article about my GWPF report on the Climategate inquiries. The Hockey Stick Illusion gets a mention too.
Italian original here. Machine translation here.
There's some interesting responses from Italian academics, which seem to centre around my having no expertise in climate science. Why they think that this would be relevant to a report about the conduct of some inquiries is anyone's guess.
Thanks are due once again to Maurizio Morabito and to Instituto Bruno Leoni for making the Italian translation happen.
Reader Comments (19)
Your radar reflection is getting bigger.
There's some interesting responses from Italian academics, which seem to centre around my having no expertise in climate science.
Its called the bottom of the barrel LOL
Off subject here, but have you seen this excellent interview with Patrick Moore on The Register:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/08/patrick_moore_greenpeace_dropout/
Off Topic - but on BBC Radio 4 tonight (10 Feb) at 9 pm we have "In Denial: Climate on the Couch". Might be worth listening to. Gillian Reynolds in the Telegraph preview says "Jenkins examines why, given all the warnings, people don't generally seem much concerned. Is it, he asks, because the doomy stuff is actually counterproductive?" She finishes by saying "I bet he doesn't challenge whether it's actually happening."
Don’t be surprised by the pathetic dismissive response of the Italian academics. Discussion of climate change in Italy and in France has little traction, largely because of differences in the political system which mean that politicians are hardly ever held to account for their actions. A Sarkozy or a Berlusconi can say one thing and do another, with no adverse political reaction, because the shifting alliances in a multi party system, and the feebleness of the serious press, means that personality counts for much more than policy.
If any questions are asked about where 50billion € of Italian taxpayers’ money invested in Sicilian windmills is going, it’ll be by an examining magistrate, not an opposition politician.
This personality-based politics has its advantages. The jungle of French or Italian politics would have no place for the spineless wonders who lead the British parties, and a cynical politician here can do a U-turn on a five centime piece as soon as the political wind changes.
Bandora, GIllian Reynolds has apparently reworded her piece, as I can't see what you referenced there any more.
Has she been got at?
Bish, I see what you mean about 'machine translation'! The Italian scientist does seem a little miffed that a non-scientist would have the termerity to dare to investigate scientists and the groups that were tasked with the various enquireies. The good Dottore doing the science comments seems to be a fan of the Team and managed to insert his obligatory 'Hail Warmings' into the script.
Neal A
Thanks for the PM/Register link. A good read - Zed won't like it one bit!
Roll on the next Greenhouse Age, although I guess we have to have a big freeze first...
steveta_uk, my quote came from Gillian Reynolds's "Pick of the Day" in the Saturday Review section that looks at the week ahead on TV and Radio. So, yes indeed, plenty of time for a re-write to conform to the editorial line.
Do you have to be a chef to be able to tell if pasta is over cooked?
@ Neal Asher
If Matt Ridley and Patrick Moore ran the world, I can't help thinking everyone would be better off.
Tim - eh, not sure about that, wasn't Matt Ridley chairman of Northern Rock?
lapogus - yes Ridley was chairman of Northern Rock...but not mthe CEO in charge of day-to-day operations. However, he did resign when the bank collapsed (showing some kind of ethical integrity), and yes he ought to have had an input on strategy that highlighted the risks of relying so heavily on the money markets. In most companies, the chairman is no more than a figurehead, leaving the job of running the company to the CEO.
"There's some interesting responses from Italian academics, which seem to centre around my having no expertise in climate science."
As you say, that has no bearing on your ability to understand and report on investigations. But quite apart from that, why oh why to people who must know better keep on proposing the fallacy that one must be an expert in order to notice an error? Have none of these academics ever been a classroom? Sooner or later the instructor will make an error and almost always it will be spotted immediately by at least one student. Do they insist that the error is not an error because the student isn't qualified?
Boneheaded or bonkers, or both.
diogenes - yes, that's a fair summary, but I think the issue of non-executive directors and their lack of real say in day to day decisions is one which has still not be addressed since the banking collapse. And as you say, at least Matt had the decency to resign, which is more than you can say for most of the high heid yins in the banking sector. I only have an occasional look at Matt's blog, but did enjoy his letters to David MacKay and his demolition of the ocean acidification scare.
I know traditional geography has gone down the pan in our educational system, but didn't realise it was universal. How could they print a picture like that?
This business of having no expertise is overdone. What expertise is needed in climate science if you are sufficiently intelligent to bone up on the theory? Hugh Miller of Cromarty had no expertise in palaeontology but applied his exceptional intelligence to the subject. Similarly Darwin. I could go on but I am sure you get the point. It takes little expertise to look at a graph of temperature and notice it has not risen in 13 years. If Arctic ice is melting it is not because temperatures are rising.
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